Hello

Waste Not Permaculture, Inc. got its start in life as a Brooklyn NY reading group about sustainability issues in the early 1990s.   After a few years as we searched for a way to define our new group, a very smart new member told us that permaculture was the future.  Upon further exploration we discovered we all agreed, we decided to name ourselves Green Phoenix Permaculture.  Our big dream was to live together in a community that reflected our shared values.   Sadly, after much search in counties north of NYC, we found nothing affordable or of shared interest.   

As luck would have it, the United Methodist Church New York Annual Conference had an underutilized camp near High Falls New York named Camp Epworth.  After meeting with the camp site committee, the Methodists agreed to let us occupy a portion of the camp. So it was that in about 2005, Green Phoenix gained the home it was seeking.   As it turned out, our leader Wilton was an architect who had just retired.  So it was that he and his wife Joan moved into the vacant manager’s cabin at Camp Epworth.  Eventually we built a timber frame, straw ball, cob and lime plaster two story house at the Camp. We soon added a large garden where we ran a community-supported agriculture (CSA) program and also kept a large flock of chickens, goats and the ever fun guinea fowl (think car alarm with feathers!).   We also hosted biennial sweat lodges led by an indigenous elder from Alberta and several permaculture design courses including two by Geoff Lawton. 

 

However, by about 2013, the Methodists were feeling the need to dispose of the camp.  So it was that in 2015, Camp Epworth became the Woodstock Farm Sanctuary.
After many years of devoted service, Wilton and Joan decided to retire to a farm near High Falls.  Greg Todd, a long time member of Green Phoenix, negotiated to start a new organization called Waste Not Permaculture using funds from Green Phoenix.  He moved the base to Brooklyn New York, where he had been working at a community garden based on permaculture principles, Imani Garden, located in the Weeksville section of Brooklyn.  And so Waste Not Permaculture was born!

 

Initially little happened with WNP due to the many tasks that Greg was juggling.  WNP was incorporated in 2017 and obtained a 501c3 in 2019 through the generous pro bono efforts of Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP.  Through a series of misadventures, Greg was forced to leave Brooklyn, his home of 45 years and relocate to Canton NY in 2022 where his son was working as an educator. 

Since moving to Canton, a lot has happened. In February 2024 WNP offered its first Permaculture Design Course in Selva Negra Nicaragua with the assistance of Andrew Faust and the Center for Bioregional Living.   Five individuals spent a total of 9 days at this incredible farm near the mountain town of Matagalpa.   Two individuals spent another 5 days in a cultural immersion experience on the exotic tropical island of Ometepe, situated in the middle of Lake Nicaragua.  WNP plans to offer this opportunity again in 2025.  Watch our website for updates.

 

Since Greg has relocated to Canton, WNP plans many new activities in this locale.   The first will be a screening of the film Common Ground in the summer or fall of 2024.  Other groups being engaged are NoCoCompost and the Canton Middle School Green Team.